NEW YORK -- Nick Kurtz swung so hard at a low curveball from Freddy Peralta that his helmet flew off while he was running out of the box. Once the ball cleared the right-field wall, Kurtz pointed towards the A’s bullpen, then he looked to the Athletics’ dugout while rounding second and saw his teammates twirling their arms in a circular motion.
This is the moment we’ve all been waiting for from the reigning American League Rookie of the Year. It took a little longer than expected, but for the first time in 2026, “Big Amish” was back to “churning butter” around the bases after slugging a Statcast-projected 363-foot solo home run.
Kurtz’s big fly was all the A’s needed in a 1-0 win at Citi Field on Sunday, securing the first series sweep of the Mets in franchise history. (The two teams played their first regular season series against each other in 2005.) It was a strong finish to what goes down as a 5-1 road trip against the two New York teams, marking the first time the A’s have won at least five games in a six-game road trip since Sept. 14-19, 2021.
If you’ve been tracking Kurtz’s at-bats over the past week or so, you knew it was only a matter of time before he finally went deep. Despite having only two extra-base hits through his first 13 games, Kurtz entered Sunday tied for second in average exit velocity (96.7 mph) among all Major League hitters, only slightly trailing Cardinals outfielder Jordan Walker (97.9 mph).
The start of Kurtz’s sophomore campaign is somewhat reminiscent of his first. After debuting on April 23 of last year, Kurtz did not homer until his 17th Major League game.
We know how that story ended. From the date of his first home run on May 13 through the end of the season, Kurtz homered 36 times while hitting .293 with a 1.052 OPS over his final 101 games, producing one of the greatest rookie performances in MLB history.
“As you know, last year I didn’t hit a homer for a certain amount of games,” Kurtz said earlier this week. “I’m a streaky home run hitter. So I’m just going to keep going up there, trying to hit the ball hard and win some ballgames.”